My opinion on Kirk...not that it matters.

[pat_k]

59. Gish galloping and cherry picked "facts" is not being "good" at debate.

His "style" of debate was the most insidious way to lie. He "knew" only the bits of history and bible and anything else that supported his vile conclusions. He was also smart enough to know that he was creating a foundation that is a lie because it excludes 80% of reality.

When arguing with another person, he flooded them with his carefully selected bits as fast as possible, then quickly moved to a new flood of cherry-picked "facts." This "style" creates an utterly false pretense of "knowing a lot" and "winning," when in fact the person knows they are offering only bits that support their conclusions and absolutely nothing more. The object is to simply steamroll over any actual facts offered in opposition with a new flood of bullshit.

When offering his monologues, he set up and tore down carefully constructed straw man positions.

He was a vile, dangerous, racist, Christian Nationalist, damaging, and cruel demagogue .

While I grieve the manner of his death as a tragic reflection of the intolerable level of gun violence in our nation – which is 11 TIMES the number of gun deaths per capita in other high-income nations, driven primarily by a firearm homicide rate that is 25 TIMES that of comparable nations* – I do not grieve the loss of a man who called for some "amazing patriot" to bail out Paul Pelosi’s attacker. I do not grieve the loss of a man who was hellbent on making sure this nation did NOTHING to reduce the number of gun deaths.

And I'm with the OP. I fear that this may indeed prove to be MAGA's Horst Wessel. Whether it was, or was not, a "false flag" operation to create a martyr, I have a terrible sinking feeling in my gut that his death will unleash further oppression of, and violence against, those who care about REAL American values -- -- values like human-rights, rule of law, religious freedom, and self-governance, and the thinking underlying those values, among them rationality, compassion as a moral imperative, and scientific inquiry.

*2015 numbers